shadfly

9.9

An insect with thin clear wings whose young live in water and adults live only a few days

noun
/ˈʃædˌflaɪ/

: efímera

On warm summer evenings, the sound of shadflies fluttering around the porch became a familiar backdrop to our gatherings.

Examples

As the sun set, we could see the shadflies dancing above the surface of the lake, their wings glistening in the fading light.
Some call them punkies, or mayflies, or black flies, or no-see-ums, but in our part of the county they're known as shadflies.

Fiction book (1998)
In late spring, the shimmering shadflies emerge from the water, filling the air with their delicate presence.

Synonyms

mayfly

vsshadfly

4 7.5

A small insect with thin wings that lives only a short time as an adult

is the same insect but uses a different common name

dayfly

vsshadfly

9.2

A small insect with thin wings whose young live in water and adults live less than two days

has identical meaning but is the more familiar common name

Surface Forms

shadfly singular

shadflies plural

Morphology

shadfly = shad + fly (semi-transparent) = shad + fly

The components 'shad' and 'fly' clearly identify an insect associated with shad, but the term is specialized and 'shad' is a low-frequency fish name, so exact meaning may not be obvious to all learners.

Etymology

Shadfly comes from shad ('a small river fish') and fly ('the insect'). These insects often appear near rivers when the shad gather, and, like the familiar mayfly, they live only a very short time as adults after living in the water as young insects, so the name links the tiny, short-lived fly to the fish and the river.